


Jingle Bell (Not) Rocks

by matrixrefugee



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-10-20 08:28:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17618942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matrixrefugee/pseuds/matrixrefugee
Summary: When something strange shows up in the Christmas display at Woolworths, PC Andy calls it in to Torchwood....





	Jingle Bell (Not) Rocks

**Author's Note:**

> Written for < lj user="adventchallenge">'s "Pet Rock". Featuring the team, with some really unwelcome Christmas presents...

Gwen's mobile started ringing just as she entered the Hub that December morning, likely Rhys checking in or telling her about some joke he had seen online. Or something more serious that had shown up on a haulage manifest. She pulled it out and flipped it open.

"Hallo?"

"Gwen? It's Andy," PC Andy Davison's voice spoke over the connection. "We've a bit of a problem over at the Woolworth's."

"Oh? What kind of trouble?" she asked, trying not to shake her head to herself as she stepped through the cog door and onto the main catwalk of the Hub.

"Yes, it's a shipment of pet rocks that showed up without warning," Andy replied.

She stopped in her tracks. "Pet rocks? Is this a joke?" she asked, wondering if Andy had called her just to hear the sound of her voice.

"Yes, pet rocks, and the head of stock never ordered them. Not exactly the most fashionable Christmas present, not like Beanie Babies."

"Neither are Beanie Babies the most fashionable present," Gwen replied. "What's this about?"

"That's where it got complicated: management thought it was domestic terrorists planting bombs in disguise, so we called in the bomb disposal unit: sniffer dogs, retrieval robots, portable x-rays, the works," Andy continued.

"And what turned up?" Gwen asked, her patience starting to wear thin. Tosh and Owen, behind their respective work stations, had started to look up and stare at her expectantly, as if they had started another round of Guess Who's Calling?

"Nothing," Andy replied, stymied.

"Nothing? You called me at work about nothing?" Gwen replied, trying not to sound cross.

"Well, nothing explosive, whatever they are. Don't appear to be bombs or anything rock-like, for that matter," Andy elaborated. She could hear voices in the background and someone barking commands. "The sniffer dogs started howling the moment they snuffed at 'em, and the x-ray showed something that didn't look like any bomb mechanism our expert had ever seen. Looked like some small creature's innards."

"Creatures?" Gwen asked, feeling her eyebrows rise. Ianto, coffee pot in hand, had joined the the pair of interlopers eying her.

"Yes, I figured you might know what the devil they might be? Maybe get them off our hands before people start asking too many questions," Andy replied.

This could turn out more serious than it seemed, Gwen realized. But she could make no guarantees they would take up the job. "All right, let me talk to my boss: we'll be over to pick up the lot, once I run it past him," she replied before hitting the disconnect.

"Andy callin' with more rubbish for us to pick up?" Owen asked, as Jack joined the four of them.

"Yes, a shipment of pet rocks at a Woolworth's. Says the store never ordered them, and bomb disposal thinks they're creatures," Gwen announced.

"Just what the city needs, a domestic terrorism false alarm," Ianto grumbled.

"Pet rocks, eh?" Jack asked, raising an eyebrow. "Sound like Gnurl eggs to me."

"Eggs?" Tosh asked, curious.

"Gnurl eggs: cuckoos of the Isop Galaxy. Used to hunt for them when I was a kid," Jack said. "They lay their eggs in odd places. The adults are semi-shape shifters. Can't actually transform, but they can project a psychic image onto themselves or their eggs, so you think that they're a rock or a pile of rubbish or a bunch of small logs and you don't give them any mind. Fools the locals -- sentient and otherwise, and sometimes I wonder how sentient some of the locals are -- unless they're canny to look for them. Nobody suspects a thing till the eggs hatch and the youngsters start gnawing on anything with a pulse that comes within striking distance."

"Sound like pleasant little creatures," Ianto noted.

"Better warm up the car, Ianto: we're going rock hunting," Jack said, all business now. "Tosh, Owen, Gwen, get those creature containment crates, the heavy duty ones."

Twenty minutes later, they pulled into the parking lot of the Woolies', finding it jammed with cars and police vehicles and milling shoppers evacuated from the store but standing in knots, rubbernecking to see what caused all the commotion. For this reason, they had a devil of a time getting to the front of the lot and close to the building.

Andy managed to make his way through the throng, the people stepping aside for him. "Wasn't expecting the welcoming committee. What's the big bang about?" Jack asked.

"Bad choice of words," Gwen groaned, following in Jack's footsteps.

"Couldn't be too careful: if it turned out to be the work of terrorists," Andy said, lowering his voice a bit. "Think you can get these things out before people get more suspicious?"

"Got the means of containing 'em. What's your cover?" Jack asked, holding up one of the creature containment cases.

"Biohazard: the rocks might contain radioactive material," Andy replied.

"That'll do," Gwen said. "Jack says they're eggs from another world."

"Alien eggs? Could class them as undocumented aliens then," Andy remarked, dryly.

"Media won't like that," Ianto said, rolling his eyes.

"Still would apply: these things hatch into semi-sentient creatures that find anything with a pulse tasty," Jack said.

"That's reassuring," Andy said, not convinced, as he turned to lead the way into the store, the team trailing him, containment crates in hand.

* * *

"So what do we do with them, and why would anyone want to pass these things as Pet Rocks of all things?" Tosh asked, as she and Jack stowed the crates in the long term storage unit.

"I'll put my ear to the ground, call in a few markers to get some intell, but if I had to make any guesses, I'd say it's the work of the Trickster's Brigade," Jack said, pushing one of the drawers shut with a knee and keying the code to seal the drawer.

"The Trickster's Brigade? Do I want to know what that is?" Tosh asked, sliding another case into another drawer before opening the case and emptying it into the drawer.

"Usually, I'd say you're better off not knowing," Jack said. "It's part of the Pantheon of Discord, a band of transcendental beings bent on altering the course of history however they can. The Trickster's one of the more powerful ones, fond of planting bugs wherever he -- broadly defined -- can stick them. Knew a woman who had a Time Beetle planted on her back, altered her whole history to the point that it created a whole alternate universe around her."

"So if these things had hatched, they would have... what? Started eating things?" Tosh asked, as Jack came over to seal the drawer.

"Eating people and tricking them into thinking other things were happening to them," Jack said, dead serious.

"Ugh. No wonder you were so quick to get them out of that store," Tosh said, shuddering.

"Make a nice omelet, too," Jack said, eying the last box.

Tosh stared at him. "You have to be kidding."

"Nope," Jack said. "When I told you I used to collect these things as a kid, I didn't go on to say we used to eat 'em."

"Please tell me they taste good," Tosh said.

"Not bad if you're hungry and there's nothing else," Jack said. "Not the sort of thing you want for Christmas brunch, though."


End file.
